The calendar said Presidents Day, but at the gas pump, it sure felt more like Memorial Day.

Prices have never risen this far this fast so early in the year.

At a national average of $3.53 a gallon Monday, gasoline is up 25 cents since the beginning of the year, The Associated Press reported. The average price in the Harrisburg area on Monday was $3.67 a gallon, according to Gasbuddy.com, up from $3.35 at the beginning of the year. Statewide, the average was $3.65 Monday.

But that’s not even the worst news.

In the same report, experts warned that prices could climb to a record $4.25 a gallon by late April.

Entering such uncharted territory leaves plenty of time for prices to surge even higher — perhaps hitting the mythical $5 mark — for the peak driving of summer, which typically kicks off on Memorial Day.

That prospect has consumers and businesses fretting about the health of the fragile economy that all but runs on oil, while questioning the sustainability of lifestyles fueled by gasoline and propelled by the personal automobile.

Gassing up his pickup at the Uni-Mart in Susquehanna Twp., Bruce Roberts described rising gas prices as a bullet “ricocheting” throughout the entire economy.

The 33-year-old painter from Pittsburgh, who plunked down $77 for the 21 gallon fill-up, expects plenty of collateral damage.

“It changes delivery costs,” Roberts said, ticking off the impacts. “It hits your food costs. All your trucking, they are going to charge more money. It all gets passed on to the consumer, and it's going to hurt.”

Americans spent 8.4 percent of their household income on gasoline last year, when gas averaged an all-time high of $3.51 a gallon. That’s double the percentage a decade ago.

Gas prices are rising at precisely the worst time for Tonia Landes of Harrisburg. The 33-year-old has a husband out of work, twins on the way in August, and she’s on disability leave from her job.

So the $20 to $25 she spends on gas each week might have to shrink further, despite the rising prices. She’s running out of things to cut.

“We haven’t gone anywhere as it is,” Landes said.

For starters, her husband, Jason, will need to find work that is close by. He recently turned down an interview for a job that would have required a daily 60-mile round-trip commute.

And you can forget the talk about gasoline prices ruining an economic recovery. From Landes’ perspective, one never started in the first place.

“I think we’re still in a recession,” she said. “It’s going to affect a lot of things. People are going to go less places.”

Under a sign that listed the wince-inducing $3.67 a gallon at the Sunoco APlus in Harrisburg, Darnel Dorsey didn’t want to think about the pain at the pump that could lie right down the road.

It’s bad enough that his 1977 Ford pickup guzzles gas with every throaty rumble of its engine such that the auto mechanic can barely cross one side of Harrisburg without feeding another $10 worth into its insatiable maw.

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